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BBC presenter Simon Reeve has revealed he planned to take his life as a teen. Picture: Instagram @simon_reeveSource:Instagram

ONE of the world’s most instantly recognisable television presenters has revealed he almost attempted suicide as a teenager.

BBC star Simon Reeve, who has fronted countless travel documentaries and has written several books on topics including terrorism, modern history and his own travels, has detailed how he once planned to jump off a bridge as a troubled 17-year-old.

In his new biography Step by Step, which is being serialised by the Mail on Sunday, Reeve writes about how his life was “in chaos” during that devastating period, and that he was plagued by suicidal thoughts.

“ … my life was in chaos: no qualifications, no girlfriend, no prospects,” he wrote.

“I had thought for weeks about using a kitchen knife on myself, about taking handfuls of pills. I thought about stepping in front of a train or a Tube.

Reeve’s travels have taken him around the world. Here he is in Libya … Picture: Instagram @simon_reeveSource:Instagram

“Then I thought about falling in front of a lorry. I looked down at one just as the horn sounded. Had the driver seen me? I will never know. It jerked me out of my moment. I started to fear the pain of dying more than I feared life. Shaking with fear, I gripped tightly and shuffled back to safety.

“I was choosing life … I went home, crept indoors, slipped into bed and cried.”

Now aged 46, Reeve is at the top of his field, with a slew of awards and decades of adventures under his belt and a happy home life with wife Anya and son Jake.

But in Step by Step, Reeve reveals how his unstable childhood pushed him towards drug and alcohol abuse and petty crime as a teen in an effort to cope.

“As a teenager, I graduated from bunking bus fares to petty vandalism to riding in stolen cars,” he wrote.

… the Caribbean … Picture: Instagram @simon_reeveSource:Instagram

“We would steal petrol from cars and start fires. We would nick fireworks from shops, then take them apart to make larger devices.

“I remember unscrewing the bottom of a CCTV camera at Ealing Broadway Shopping Centre, packing an explosive device inside and then watching it blow up before racing off, laughing. It was a stupid, destructive thrill.”

He was also drawn towards violence.

“By the age of 13, I was getting into fights with local kids and going to school with a huge Rambo knife,” Reeve wrote.

… Greenland … Picture: Instagram @simon_reeveSource:Instagram

“I even bought a replica pistol that fired blanks. I once pulled it out when a group of us got into a fight with an older group of travellers in a local park.”

Reeve even admitted to being drunk at school on several occasions, before a teacher noticed what was happening and set him on the right path.

He ended up taking a trip to Scotland, where he discovered his love for travel and adventure — and ended up sparking his wildly successful future travel documentary career.

While Reeve believes “depressive thoughts” will probably always be with him, even now in adulthood with a thriving career and family, he said he had the maturity and perspective to get through low points.

And Honduras … Picture: Instagram @simon_reeveSource:Instagram

“The negative voices can be hushed, ignored, sometimes even laughed at. But doubtless they will always be at least an occasional background whisper,” he wrote.